


Pigeon Scratch

by somebodyslight



Category: Kuroshitsuji | Black Butler
Genre: Gen, Painting, Something Fun For Once, Who Was To Paint Whom Was Not Specified, _____ Me Prompt Meme
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2013-05-29
Updated: 2013-05-29
Packaged: 2017-12-13 08:43:13
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 481
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/822318
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/somebodyslight/pseuds/somebodyslight
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>For a prompt meme on Tumblr, requested by flecksofpoppy.<br/>"Paint Me" - William & Pigeons</p>
            </blockquote>





	Pigeon Scratch

**Author's Note:**

  * For [flecksofpoppy](https://archiveofourown.org/users/flecksofpoppy/gifts).



As a rule, William never has company over to his place. There are two reasons for this: the first being that he doesn’t particularly care for any of the obvious potential guests, the second being that his flat is never in any state to entertain in. It isn’t that it’s disorderly, per se, it’s more that his hobbies and their end products take up large amounts of space and they aren’t necessarily anything he would care to share with anyone.

Oils are the current favorite medium, although he has dabbled in watercolors, charcoals, and pastels in the past, but his subject never changes and his growing collection of portraits of pigeons and their relatives is, put lightly, embarrassing. His newest works are arranged haphazardly on the mantle; others are leaned up against bare walls in stacks, tucked between and behind pieces of furniture, set out on every free surface he has available. His bookshelves hold only the journals of simple drawings and anatomical sketches that he kept in his Academy years and adds to in his rare off-time while working.

Most recently, he’s tried his hand at the current trend of Impressionism, but he’s finding it not to his liking and, for the first time in nearly a century, he discovers he has artist’s block. So when not one, but two, pigeons arrive on his windowsill one night, with letters from Personnel (denying his request for additional staff once again) and Scythes (regarding an inquiry about a scythe modified by one Grell Sutcliffe), William is doing nothing more than swirling Cadmium Yellow around on his palette with no real intention of putting anything on the canvas.

Despite his quick dismissal of the birds, neither is in any hurry to leave and one of them perches on his shoulder, cooing incessantly about _ink, ink, ink, paper, ink, paper, ink_ and William truly wishes the silly thing could form complete sentences because it doesn’t let up when he insists he has no correspondence to send back, no matter how he chooses his words, and the other just silently bobs its head in agreement with the first’s nonsense.

Finally, William crosses the room to his desk and sets out a page of stationery and an inkwell, which one of the birds promptly flips open and dips a foot into. Before he can object, the other pigeon has joined in making thready black smears across the page. A drag of a foot, a flutter over to the inkwell, a couple hops in a place that quite clearly needs to be darker. Very slowly, William comes to the realization of what exactly they’re doing.

William’s new favorite art piece is not of pigeons, but created by them: a portrait of himself, signed with two tiny footprints, and he proudly displays it, framed, in his study. He’s almost disappointed that it’ll never be seen by anyone else.


End file.
